


Reflections

by Siha



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-04
Updated: 2012-07-04
Packaged: 2017-11-09 04:06:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/451072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siha/pseuds/Siha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Shepard's visit in Huerta Memorial Hospital, Thane attempts to set things right with the man who made his lover smile before he came.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reflections

# Reflections

The whole place is illuminated. Light falls through large windows and climbs up white walls as if to suggest this was a place of peace, of life.  
In fact, death comes across just as often in hospitals, even in the Presidium's best clinic.

Thane has seen many people die, and in most cases, he didn't care. Death is routine in his line of work and killing an art he has mastered.  
But facing his own death is different. He was down to the point where he had nothing left to lose, with his beloved wife gone and his son far away.  
Then Shepard appeared, and Shepard changed his world. She changes worlds casually, somewhere along her way.   
Worlds and lives and history.  
Thane admires her for her strength and for her way to always get what she wants without demanding too much. With words and wits she gave him Kolyat back, his little boy all grown up, rescued him from a path too dark to walk. The commander saved the child Thane failed to raise, and he is grateful for it.

He is grateful for all she has done. For listening, for being the first since his wife passed away to listen.  
For talking, for all her stories, for all her thoughts.  
For caring, for that look on her face when she said she cared, for her arms around his neck and her lips locked with his, for caring about him.  
They fought a battle nobody expected to survive and Shepard got her whole team out alive. Now she is off to save the galaxy, out there hunting the stars for whatever enemy they hide, and he is caught in hospital.

Hours blur into days on a station without night. There is always light in here.  
Huerta Memorial Hospital is simply a clinic, and should anyone come visit him with an old grudge, they would find Thane off-guard and ready to face his end.  
The nurses wake him in the morning to check up on his condition. Pills for breakfast.  
Afterwards, he can turn to what his left of a training routine. His illness made him lose weight ever since he got into hospital, but he tries to keep his muscles flexible, tries to stay in shape.  
There may be no need to for he has fought all his battles, but you never know what waits around the corner.

The Citadel is the heart of galactic civilization, seat of the Council and epicentre of the disaster looming behind the horizon.  
War isn't coming, and Thane knows it. War is already here.  
It gets more and more busy as the Reapers spread throughout the galaxy, and soon refugees swarm the place. Patients are lined up in the halls because there is no room in the already over-populated chambers.

Among them, Thane is a stranger, his species a rare sight. He keeps to himself and watches the news, each day a dozen new reports of casualties and dying words.  
Amidst the chaos, Shepard stands her ground.  
Oh, could he be there with her, when she charges into the frontline and hurtles enemies up in the air with her biotics, could he be there to make sure nobody strikes her from behind.

He isn't the only person in Huerta Memorial Hospital who thought this way. There is someone else, a human, Alliance Major, another friend of hers.  
A former lover, Shepard told him, her past before she met Thane.  
And as the galaxy keeps falling apart, Thane finds himself on the doorstep of this very man. He looks bad, his face all bruised and swollen, but Thane has no doubt he will return to the Normandy soon, if allowed to.  
There is something about Shepard that draws people snd keeps them at her side, no matter what happens. But Thane is here, bound by his own mortality, and at peace.

They always knew. Major Alenko knows, too.

He looks him over, openly surprised how vital Thane appears for a dying man.  
He cannot see how hard it is too breathe or how his muscles won't stretch the way they should.   
He cannot see how close he is.

All he does see is an alien with dark green eyes who seems to be at peace, and surely that would be a surprise, as he is not and he has been with the very woman who claims she loves the alien.  
Thane told her he would watch over the Major while she is gone. A blind could see he is still important to her.

“Krios,” the wounded mumbles “I take it?”  
Thane tilts his head, his version of a nod.  
“Major Alenko.”  
“You can drop the title.” Clumsily, he sits up.  
“Actually,” he alters his last statement “Kaidan is fine, I guess.”  
“Then Thane it is to you, my friend.”

He doesn't say it, but Thane can clearly read “I'm not your friend” in the human's eyes. He cannot blame him.

“Here on Shepard's account?” Kaidan asks, and Thane shakes his head as he walks towards the bed. The door slides closed behind him, and all the noise is far away at once, sighs and sobs and screams.  
“Not exactly,” Thane answers, “I was curious to meet you.”  
“As was I.”

An awkward silence settles in. Thane takes post besides the bed, hands behind his back, not too close, not too far.  
“She didn't talk about me, did she?” Kaidan doesn't really want an answer, Thane can sense his disappointment.  
“Not too much, no.”  
Yet more disappointment.  
“I read the report on Horizon; I believe the wound was still too fresh.”  
“Horizon,” Kaidan repeats with agony in his voice, “was one big mistake.”  
He raises an eyebrow as he remembers.

“You weren't there.”  
“I was not,” Thane comments, “it was a few weeks later that she picked me up.”

Second eyebrow raised.  
“Just how long do you know her?”  
“Long enough.” Thane smiles; Drell smiles are not too different from human smiles, he has learned with Shepard. It's just that they don't leave those gentle wrinkles, because Drell grow scales where human skin is soft.  
“Yet, not as long as I would like.”  
“As you both would like, I suppose.”

Another awkward pause. They are both men of battle, not of words, and they barely know the other's species.  
Kaidan's gaze wanders, as do Thane's feet. There is no wall, just windows. The artificial sky is magnificent, yet, it isn't real. The ponds and the trees are, as well as the people, all the people swarming the streets like ants.  
War is here.

“It sucks, huh?” Kaidan's voice is low, at the same time sad and angry.  
“Being locked up here.”  
For a while, they fall silent again, and Thane's breath rattles the air until he chokes on it.  
How much time is left, he cannot say. He needn't.

“It grants me peace,” he finally answers, “I do not think it does the same for you.”  
“I'm a soldier. Should be out there.”  
“You surely will again.”  
Time is a funny concept; here they are, and while Kaidan suffers for each day that passes, Thane is joyful for the very same thing. One more day to see the beauty of this galaxy, even as it is shaken by battle.

“Take care of her,” he pleads.  
“I will,” Kaidan promises. “Though I guess she's watching out for herself.”  
Thane turns his head to meet the stranger's eyes again, and suddenly, they both smile.  
“You know she doesn't,” Thane smirks.  
“Yeah. Guess she never will.”

And with that, all is said and nothing is. There is so much to ask, so much to answer, but both men struggle to find the words. For now, it is enough.  
With a single, silent nod Thane turns to leave.

“If there is anything you need,” Thane assures the Major, “just let me know.”  
“I will,” Kaidan mutters and Thane knows he won't.  
As the door shuts behind him, their conversation ends, and so does whatever chance they had to set things right. One cannot set things right with a man who loves the very light of one's life, the very reason to go on.

Thane sweeps through the hall unnoticed.  
For all his rarity out here, he is still an assassin. For all his illness, he still knows how to blend in.  
His room is lit and quiet, his few personal belongings tidily locked away. Calm and collected after his talk with Major Alenko Thane feels ready to face another evening and another night only indicated by his clock.  
They keep the artificial sunlight on, no matter what hour.  
There is peace in here, in the middle of the war-zone, and if it is for just one man, it still suffices.

**Author's Note:**

> This story was actually written for my study application in Games Design.  
> The task was to write about one day in the life of a video game character and include dialogue if possible.  
> I chose Thane because he has very, very little to do, so I wouldn't end up describing boring tasks and had room for actually putting some meaning to it.  
> Originally, I had planned to use the ME2-context and have him talk to Shepard, but there was too much to say for my strict word limit and it didn't even get men anywhere.  
> So I ended up with Kaidan, and you've just read my result.


End file.
